When you hear control tower, you probably think of NASA or an airport control tower. People buzzing about in a big room full of screens showing various statistics and blips rhythmically darting across screens. They are talking on phones, frantically typing emails, and shouting across the tower to make things happen cohesively and quickly. The control tower is a hub of activity and action, the apex of a volcano just shy of bubbling over.
The idea behind control tower for supply chain management has a similar feel in concept. It’s a single platform providing full visibility and complete management capabilities for the entire supply chain. As supply chains evolve into more complex creatures with ever-changing regulations and emerging tech, control tower may be just the thing to maximize efficiency and increase profitability. Let’s look at control tower and see if it’s a good fit for your business.
What is Control Tower?
A control tower is a central hub that monitors, manages, and controls decisions and execution. It also has the essential technology, organization, and procedures in place to capture and use transportation data to help make both short- and long-term decisions. It provides real-time visibility, cross-network collaboration options, and AI capabilities to help make systems work more autonomously.
The Benefits of Control Tower
More businesses are considering control tower because of the many benefits it brings. One of the most important benefits is how it provides end-to-end supply chain visibility for all stakeholders from suppliers to retailers. In that same vein, it also allows stakeholders to collaborate and share information in real-time. Additionally, control tower offers the one-two-punch of not only responding and adapting to supply chain disruptions but also in predictive decision-making. Finally, it harnesses the power of AI with autonomous decision-making and control to boost productivity.
How Do I Implement Control Tower?
If you haven’t already, you’ll need to transition to a digital supply chain. Digital supply chain in itself has many benefits such as reduced risk, improved agility, and reduced costs. Being fully digital also empowers companies to learn from their data. Once a company is 100-percent digitized and transparent, it can then bring on the automated actions needed to become a control tower. This includes machine-learning algorithms, tracing capabilities, and task automation.
Why not manage your supply chain from “way up on high?” Control tower offers full visibility, so you can control your supply chain from every vantage point. A control tower also harnesses technology so that you can use your data in the way that most benefits your business—collaborate with partners, analyze, and automate. It also alleviates risk in the supply chain, which helps with day-to-day management challenges. This is where control tower really shines. It identifies exceptions, enables decisions, and executes workflow automation. This is the standard supply chains need to function at to be most efficient and most profitable. It’s the next frontier for industry leaders.